Flamethrower - Maggie Estep [37]
This didn’t help either. Ruby gruffly handed the two dozen prize tickets she’d won to a small chubby child then stalked out of the arcade and headed for the beach.
She felt like she was being crushed.
Weak waves lapped at the shore. The low-hanging yellow moon would have been pretty under most circumstances, but all Ruby could think was that it was yellow from pollution that was all the fault of George Bush, who seemed determined to rape and deplete the earth. Ruby took the opportunity to blame George Bush and his handlers for everything. The Disneyfication of New York City. The dumbing down of suburban America youth, and the ridiculous hypocritical espousal of a religion that forbade stem cell research but was just fine with killing thousands of full-grown humans. It made Ruby’s stomach hurt. She was so knotted-up she couldn’t bear staring at the dirty water any longer and started slowly walking back toward Astroland.
She hadn’t meant to, but Ruby walked by the sideshow, stopping to watch Lucio, who was out front, on the platform, performing a few minutes of his act in order to entice passersby inside to see the full ten-in-one sideshow. His neck was arched back as he swallowed a flame from a wand he held above his head. About a dozen people were standing around him in a semicircle, and nearly all had their mouths hanging open. Eating fire wasn’t really that difficult—Ruby had even done it a few times—but Lucio did it so beautifully. And that was difficult.
Ruby didn’t want Lucio to see her standing there admiring him. She kept walking.
It was still early, but Ruby put on her red nightgown and got into bed with Rats for company. Eventually, sleep came.
13. FIRE
The next few days were a blur, time shifting but barely moving under an orb of swollen sun. In the mornings, Ruby went to The Hole, spent time with her horse, and did her chores. Afternoons, she went to bark at strangers at the horse-racing game. Some days she worked with Glenda, others with Glenda’s son, Rafael, a lecherous muscle head who was always trying to look down Ruby’s shirt even though Ruby wore sports bras.
Ruby didn’t exactly get a lot of joy out of her work at the game. It vaguely fulfilled the fantasy Ruby had shared with many kids about running away and joining the circus. Mostly though, it was tedious and loud, and Ruby would go home with her bones hurting.
Five days into her stint as a game worker, Ruby got a letter from Ed: “Sorry about the silence, and thank you for taking care of the cats. Here’s some money for their upkeep. I’ll be in touch soon.”
She punched the wall so hard she broke the skin on her knuckles and scared the cats. Her hand hurt afterward, and both piano playing and yoga became painful.
The night after her eighth day working at the horse-racing game, Ruby felt so low she wanted to crawl into a hole and die. She tried to seem normal and friendly to Glenda as the older woman paid her for the day. But even Glenda, who wasn’t exactly the intuitive sort, realized something was wrong.
“What’s wrong?” she asked as she watched Ruby stuff the cash in her pocket.
“Nothing,” Ruby lied.
“Okay,” Glenda shrugged, “see you tomorrow.”
Ruby stopped in front of the sideshow, glancing up to the second floor where the Coney Island Museum’s windows were. She remembered cheerier times when she’d take a chair and park it in front of a window, sit there smoking and staring out at all the bustling of Astroland.
It was close to seven now, and the sideshow was in full swing. Todd, one of the talkers, was outside inciting the masses to come on in and see the show. Ruby went in half hoping that Bob would be there drinking a beer with Eek, the tattooed-head-to-toe performer/ticket taker who was one of the better known denizens of Coney. Bob wasn’t there, but, judging by the speculative look Eek gave Ruby, she figured Bob had told everyone that he’d fired her from the museum. Thankfully she was long past caring.
“Gonna watch the show,” she told Eek as she walked by the desk where he sat selling tickets. She